


Empathy

by hades_bitch



Category: Naruto
Genre: Asuma is a good brother, Empathy, Hurt/Comfort, Rhyming, is this poetry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-08
Updated: 2020-05-08
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:28:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24078250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hades_bitch/pseuds/hades_bitch
Summary: What if Iruka got tired of being too nice, too kind, too loving?
Relationships: Sarutobi Asuma & Umino Iruka
Comments: 3
Kudos: 18





	Empathy

**Author's Note:**

> Howdy, y'all!  
> I stayed up all night writing this, because of a song I heard from TikTok.  
> If any of y'all feel like this, please tell in the comments! Enjoy reading!

The Third takes out his pipe, stuffing it with tobacco, lights it up and takes a drag, exhaling the smoke throughout the office. He stares at the kind young boy before him, head bandaged, his life almost taken away too early because of his loving heart.

“Iruka, he softly said, “I think you should consider taking the academy’s entrance exam and become a teacher. We can use more people like you, for your heart, to prepare the next gen-“

“You mean my kind, caring, _loving, useless_ heart?” Iruka spats out, cutting the Hokage. His fists are clenched, and he’s trying not to tremble too much from the anger that is boiling inside of him because he suggested that. “That same heart, that almost cost Kakashi's mission? The intel the village almost lost, because of me?!” By now, Iruka couldn’t control his emotions, yelling at the Hokage, eyes wild. Realization flashes through the young ninjas’ face. The realization that he is _yelling at the Hokage_. 

Iruka turns around to leave before he can say anything more incriminating. As he is reaching for the doorknob, it opens revealing the younger Sarutobi, Asuma. He doesn’t stop Iruka from leaving though, the boy just sidesteps him and runs off.

Asuma’s eyes stick on the boy's back, watching him run away, before turning back to face his father. “What happened here?” He questions, eyebrows raised at his senior. The elder just sighs, taking another hit from his pipe. He ponders for a while, blowing smoke rings that float up to the ceiling, dissipating while his son gets a tad bit impatient waiting for him to explain.

The Hokage gets up from his chair to face the village below him. "Iruka almost cost us an important planting mission because his heart is too soft and almost died in the process. So I suggested that he become a teacher, to teach the next generation, and he lashed out at me.”

Asuma huffs at that, thinking about his basically already brother. “What reaction did you think you were going to get when you tell a ninja to practically hang up his field time? A thank you?? I swear father, sometimes you don’t think things through.” 

Hiruzen turned around to look at his son with a blank face, at that remark.

Asuma wipes a hand down his face, breathing in deeply. “I’ll go talk to the little squirt and try to fix what you did then.” He walks out of office, already knowing where Iruka went, as he goes there every time he’s upset.

  
~~  
  


Asuma finds Iruka sitting on top of a mossy rock, in a field barred off from the world by a ring of trees. He's sure to emit some sound while he's walking up to him, so he doesn't frighten the younger boy. That doesn't matter because when he flops down next to Iruka, because the Chunin startles a little, trying to quickly use his arms to clear the tear tracks from his face.

"Oh hi, there Asuma." Iruka tries to play it off, by acting nonchalant, but Asuma can tell he's got something he wants to say, to get off his chest.

"Just spit it out already kid, we're family." Asuma gives Iruka his best, 'you can do it smile', hoping that the teen will open up some.

"I cannot give anymore." Iruka dejectedly says, looking at the moss on the rock, picking at it.

"What?" Ausma responded dumbly.

"I cannot give anymore," he says more strongly, getting up from his rock, pacing like a caged tiger, "Fuck, but my whole personality's built around kindness, and if I cannot give then I'm what? Stuck."

"So let’s work this out. What's wrong with your heart?" Asuma, following with his eyes, already knowing some of what's his problem from what he gathered from his father.

"It won't come out, no it won't even start." 

"And then moving on, what's wrong with your brain?"

"It yearns for the past, but it won't be the same." Iruka’s tone getting nostalgic.

Asuma gets up too, walking over in front of Iruka's path grabbing his shoulders, stopping him from making a groove in the ground any further. "It’s clear to see, you’ve got a disease. Well, it’s called empathy. It means you'll give blood, till there's none left to bleed." He finished with what he hoped was a calming smile. Iruka's face scrunched up turning a deep red. He shoves Asuma’s hands from off him, and looks up at eyes, Iruka's own eyes blazing and yells in his face,

"BUT I DO NOT WANT TO BE KIND!"

"What?" Asuma said, shocked, the smile falling from his face that _Iruka_ , would say such a thing.

"I only want to survive…" Iruka goes back to pacing in his groove.

"No, you don't. You nee-"

"These efforts exhausting, it's getting me nowhere," Iruka cuts him off, continuing to say what's plaguing him, "and where does that leave me-"

"Alone." Iruka stops pacing at that. He has never thought of it that way. Asuma walks toward the frozen kid.

"You, do not have a choice, the honey slips into your voice. Kindness flows through your veins, Iruka. That is something that can not be changed." Tears start to come down Iruka's face upon hearing what Asuma is saying. "Caring is what fulfills you." Asuma pulls the crying teen in his arms again, hugging him tightly.

"Learn to harness it, before it kills you, _please_."

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Please comment on what y'all think, I would love to know.  
> Till next time!


End file.
